I swallow hard and tap it.
There's only one message.
Sent late last night.
Right after she accused me.
Right after she walked away with a face I can't stop replaying.
"Ash, I don't understand what's happening. Please talk to me. I really wanna help you."
The words hit my ribs like a punch.
Help.
She wants to help.
A bitter breath escapes me as I lean back until my head thuds gently against the wall.
"Help," I whisper, the word tasting wrong in my mouth.
Help me with what?
She's the one dating a monster.
She's the one getting dragged into someone else's gravity so hard she can't even see the ground disappearing under her feet.
She has no idea who Samuel Blake really is.
Calculated.
Strategic.
Dangerous.
He's the type who stomps others into the dirt just to keep his own shoes clean.
And she thinks I'm the one who needs help?
My chest tightens.
I scrub a hand over my face, frustration crawling up my spine.
What would her dad think of all this?
Nate, the only adult who ever made sense to me. Warm. Solid. Steady.
Someone who treated me like I mattered, even when I didn't feel like I did.
The last time I asked Lena about him, she wouldn't meet my eyes. Said he was "still busy in Germany."
But her voice dipped. Just a fraction.
Barely anything, unless you were me, and you could read her like a secret language.
She misses him.
I know that now.
The sadness was clinging to her lashes like it was waiting to fall.
I tried calling him, back then. More than once.
Disconnected.
Changed.
Blocked.
I don't know.
I should've asked her.
I didn't.
Life kept punching and I kept forgetting, and now all I have is this one message blinking at me like an open wound.
Please talk to me.
I want to.
God, I want to.
But what am I supposed to say?
Hey Lena, sorry I vanished. Also, your boyfriend's destroying my life. Also also, watching him kiss you is still carving holes in my ribs. Hope you dump him eventually and remember you once loved me. K bye.
Yeah. No.
My phone dims.
My eyes sting.
I don't reply.
I can't.
Not yet.
Across the room, Alice glances at me while cracking eggs into a pan. She notices the tension in my jaw, the way I'm gripping my phone like it might shatter.
But she doesn't ask.
She just keeps cooking, like making breakfast for two exhausted, broken idiot brothers is the most natural thing in the world.
Josh lounges on a stool, watching her with thinly veiled suspicion, as if testing whether she's secretly poisoning his eggs.
The smell of butter and toasted bread fills the apartment.
For a small, gentle moment… the chaos settles.
But the ache in my chest doesn't.
Lena's unsent message burns under my skin like a bruise I can't touch.
⟡ ✧ ⟡
I'm halfway through my toast when Alice's phone starts screeching like a panicked alarm. She frowns, wipes her hands on her pajama shorts, and picks it up.
The second her thumb unlocks the screen, her entire face drains — like someone yanked the plug out of her soul.
"What the hell is this?" she whispers.
I don't know what "this" is, but my stomach drops anyway.
She turns the screen toward me.
A thread.
A long, performative, faux-concerned post from Samuel Blake, written like a saint bravely reporting sin.
SamuelBlakeOfficial:
"This is hard to say, but I'm worried about a friend.
Talent can't excuse inappropriate behavior forever.
I hope he gets help.
People deserve honesty."
Attached?
Screenshots.
Blurred photos.
Rumors dressed up like concern.
One photo shows Ms. Clarke adjusting the mic on my costume backstage. Another where she hugged me briefly after rehearsal, the night I nearly passed out from exhaustion.
Perfectly normal moments.
Twisted into something ugly.
Captioned:
"Some boundaries aren't meant to be crossed. Especially between a student and a teacher."
Teacher.
Meaning Ms. Clarke.
The implication slaps me so hard my breath catches.
"He's saying I slept with Clarke to get the role," I choke out.
Alice scrolls, her face growing paler with each line.
There's another photo. Me stumbling outside the bar last night, right before I collapsed. It looks bad. Worse than bad. Like a cautionary tale with legs.
'He's been unstable for a while. I hope he stops dragging people down with him.'
My vision blurs at the edges.
And the comments…
God!
People from college.
Strangers.
Bots.
Everyone lining up like they've been waiting for the slaughter.
@theatreteaqueen:
Ms. Clarke is SO getting fired for this.
@puresoul_95:
Didn't someone say he's living with a girl?? Benefits??
@randomdude39:
Rent discount for sure.
Then they find Alice.
Of course they do.
@literallywhy:
Sis are you okay??
@trollfactory:
So he moved from teacher to roommate? Pick a lane lol.
@menareterrible:
Report him. You're probably a victim too.
Alice grips the counter like the ground just tilted under her.
"Why? Why are they talking about me? I don't even know these people!"
Her voice trembles.
She looks genuinely scared.
Something sharp and animal stirs in my chest.
Josh, meanwhile, chews a pancake like he's watching a nature documentary about my extinction.
"Well. Damn."
He swallows.
"Your life is a disaster movie."
I drag both hands over my face, trying to steady myself.
"This is Samuel," I say, voice low. "He did this. All of it."
Of course he did.
The perfect boyfriend with perfect smiles and perfect charm.
Always holding Lena like she's a trophy he's polishing for the camera.
Alice puts her phone down carefully, like it might start screaming again.
"I didn't even post anything," she whispers. "Why are they coming after me?"
"Because people are idiots," Josh says. "And because Ash here attracts drama like bread attracts pigeons."
"Josh," I snap, or try to. My voice cracks instead.
Alice steps closer, searching my face. She sees the unraveling, the exhaustion, the panic, the grief duct-taped together.
"Ash… talk to me. Please."
But I can't.
Not with the room too bright and my head too loud and the comments cutting into me like teeth.
Samuel isn't just ruining my reputation.
He's dragging Lena.
He's dragging Alice.
He's everywhere.
He's winning.
And I'm too broken to land a punch.
Josh and Alice move to the living room, talking in low, worried voices, the kind people use around wounded animals so as not to scare them.
I can't sit there.
I can't breathe there.
So while Josh mutters something about "damage control" and Alice attempts to report the trolls, I slip away quietly, ghost-like.
The bathroom door clicks shut behind me.
The moment the lock turns, my stomach lurches violently.
I barely make it to the toilet before I'm retching.
Not just from last night's alcohol, though that's definitely wreaking revenge; it's something deeper.
Hot.
Violent.
Like panic is clawing its way out of my body.
When it stops, I'm shaking.
Sweat clinging to my hair.
Throat burning.
I flush, wipe my mouth, stumble to the sink.
I turn on the tap.
Cold water roars out, echoing in the tiny bathroom like static.
I splash it onto my face until the temperature bites.
When I finally look up…
I freeze.
The mirror.
That mirror.
My reflection looks wrong.
Not physically, trauma just skews the angles.
My face stares back like a stranger wearing my bones.
Eyes too red.
Skin too pale.
Jaw clenched hard enough to crack.
I grip the sink, knuckles whitening.
"Why…"
My voice breaks.
"…why is this happening again?"
The room shrinks.
The air thickens.
My pulse stutters, jagged and uneven.
My reflection blurs, sharpens, blurs again.
"I'm losing everything…"
The words fog the glass, hang there a second, then disappear, like they weren't even mine.
Outside, I hear Alice laugh nervously at something Josh says.
Normal life.
Living-room normal.
But in here?
In here feels like the cliff edge of something.
My hands tremble so badly I brace myself against the cold porcelain just to stay upright.
The water is still running.
I don't turn it off.
Turning it off means leaving.
And I don't think I can leave yet.
I lower my head.
Close my eyes.
Breathe, one shaking inhale at a time.
The worst part isn't the lies.
It's how quickly everyone believes them.